Read Online Who Killed Palomino Molero? by Mario Vargas Llosa - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Mario Vargas Llosa
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talk made me forget the dead kid. He’s been on my mind ever since I saw him up in the pasture. Sometimes I even get nightmares. I hope tonight I won’t.”
He said goodbye to Doña Adriana at the door of her restaurant and walked to the station. He and the lieutenant slept there, Silva in a large room next to the office and Lituma in a sort of shed near the cells. As he walked through the deserted streets, he imagined the lieutenant scratching at the restaurant windows and whispering words of love to the empty air.
At the station, he found a piece of paper stuck on the door handle so someone would see it. He carefully took it down, went inside, and turned on the light. The note had been written in blue ink by an educated person with good handwriting:
Palomino Molero’s killers kidnapped him from Doña Lupe’s house in Amotape. She knows what happened. Ask her.
The station regularly received anonymous notes, usually about unfaithful wives or husbands or about smugglers. This was the first about the death of Palomino Molero.
5
“Amotape, what kind of a name is that?” asked Lieutenant Silva sarcastically. “Can it be true that it comes from that story about the priest and his maid? What do you think, Doña Lupe?”
Amotape is thirty miles south of Talara, surrounded by sun-parched rocks and scorching sand dunes. There are dry bushes, carob thickets, and here and there a eucalyptus tree—pale green patches that brighten the otherwise monotonous gray of the arid landscape. The trees bend over, stretch out and twist around to absorb whatever moisture might be in the air; in the distance they look like dancing witches. In their benevolent shade, herds of squalid goats are always nibbling the crunchy pods that fall off their branches; there are also some sleepy mules and a shepherd, usually a small boy or girl, sunburnt, with bright eyes.
“Do you think that old story about Amotape with the priest and his maid is the truth, Doña Lupe?”
The hamlet is a confusion of adobe huts and little corrals made from wooden stakes. It has a few aristocratic houses clustered around an old plaza with a wooden gazebo. There are almond trees, bougainvilleas, and a stone monument to Simón Rodriguez, Simón Bolivar’s teacher, who died in this solitary place. The citizens of Amotape, poor, dusty folks, live off their goats, their cotton fields, and the truck and bus drivers who detour between Talara and Sullana in order to drink some chicha , the local corn beer, or have a snack.
The name of the town, according to local legend, comes from colonial times, when Amotape, a rich town then, had a greedy parish priest who hated to feed visitors. His maid abetted him in this by warning him whenever she saw a traveler approaching. She would call out, “Amo, tape, tape la olla, que viene gente” (Master, cover, cover the pot, people are coming). Could it be true?
“Who knows,” murmured the woman at last. “Maybe yes, maybe no. God only knows.”
She was very thin with olive-colored parchment-like skin that sagged and hung from her cheekbones and upper arms. From the moment she saw them coming, she had a look of distrust on her face. “More distrust than people usually have on their faces when they spot us,” thought Lituma. She studied them with deep-sunk, frightened eyes, and occasionally rubbed her arms as if she’d felt a chill. When her eyes met theirs, she tried to smile, but it was so false it made her look like a cheap whore. “You’re scared shitless, lady,” thought Lituma. “You know something.” She’d looked at them like that as she served them fried and salted banana chips and stewed kid with rice. And she went on looking at them like that every time the lieutenant asked her to refill their gourds with chicha .
When would Lieutenant Silva start asking her questions? Lituma felt the corn beer going to his head. It was high noon and hot as hell. He and the lieutenant were the only customers. Looking out the
He said goodbye to Doña Adriana at the door of her restaurant and walked to the station. He and the lieutenant slept there, Silva in a large room next to the office and Lituma in a sort of shed near the cells. As he walked through the deserted streets, he imagined the lieutenant scratching at the restaurant windows and whispering words of love to the empty air.
At the station, he found a piece of paper stuck on the door handle so someone would see it. He carefully took it down, went inside, and turned on the light. The note had been written in blue ink by an educated person with good handwriting:
Palomino Molero’s killers kidnapped him from Doña Lupe’s house in Amotape. She knows what happened. Ask her.
The station regularly received anonymous notes, usually about unfaithful wives or husbands or about smugglers. This was the first about the death of Palomino Molero.
5
“Amotape, what kind of a name is that?” asked Lieutenant Silva sarcastically. “Can it be true that it comes from that story about the priest and his maid? What do you think, Doña Lupe?”
Amotape is thirty miles south of Talara, surrounded by sun-parched rocks and scorching sand dunes. There are dry bushes, carob thickets, and here and there a eucalyptus tree—pale green patches that brighten the otherwise monotonous gray of the arid landscape. The trees bend over, stretch out and twist around to absorb whatever moisture might be in the air; in the distance they look like dancing witches. In their benevolent shade, herds of squalid goats are always nibbling the crunchy pods that fall off their branches; there are also some sleepy mules and a shepherd, usually a small boy or girl, sunburnt, with bright eyes.
“Do you think that old story about Amotape with the priest and his maid is the truth, Doña Lupe?”
The hamlet is a confusion of adobe huts and little corrals made from wooden stakes. It has a few aristocratic houses clustered around an old plaza with a wooden gazebo. There are almond trees, bougainvilleas, and a stone monument to Simón Rodriguez, Simón Bolivar’s teacher, who died in this solitary place. The citizens of Amotape, poor, dusty folks, live off their goats, their cotton fields, and the truck and bus drivers who detour between Talara and Sullana in order to drink some chicha , the local corn beer, or have a snack.
The name of the town, according to local legend, comes from colonial times, when Amotape, a rich town then, had a greedy parish priest who hated to feed visitors. His maid abetted him in this by warning him whenever she saw a traveler approaching. She would call out, “Amo, tape, tape la olla, que viene gente” (Master, cover, cover the pot, people are coming). Could it be true?
“Who knows,” murmured the woman at last. “Maybe yes, maybe no. God only knows.”
She was very thin with olive-colored parchment-like skin that sagged and hung from her cheekbones and upper arms. From the moment she saw them coming, she had a look of distrust on her face. “More distrust than people usually have on their faces when they spot us,” thought Lituma. She studied them with deep-sunk, frightened eyes, and occasionally rubbed her arms as if she’d felt a chill. When her eyes met theirs, she tried to smile, but it was so false it made her look like a cheap whore. “You’re scared shitless, lady,” thought Lituma. “You know something.” She’d looked at them like that as she served them fried and salted banana chips and stewed kid with rice. And she went on looking at them like that every time the lieutenant asked her to refill their gourds with chicha .
When would Lieutenant Silva start asking her questions? Lituma felt the corn beer going to his head. It was high noon and hot as hell. He and the lieutenant were the only customers. Looking out the
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